Writing on the Wall

Albany Barn, Inc. will present “Letter Head” on Friday, July 6, 2012, at Stage 1, a community art space located at 46 North Swan Street in Albany. A reception will be held from 5:00pm – 9:00pm in conjunction with the monthly “1st Friday” arts walk in the City of Albany. Refreshments will be served and the 1st Friday Trolley will provide complimentary transportation to and from the venue. Music by DJ O.F.I. Admission is free.

“Letter Head” features the work of “Straight Crooked,” a collaboration between artists MC3 and Rico Pendejo that evolved from the artists’ mutual love of freight train and street art culture, and sign painting. Straight Crooked’s designs reference music and pop culture to celebrate very personal memories of their formative years, such as graffiti and skateboarding, and elevate the associated genre forms. For “Letter Head,” Straight Crooked is joined by Frank Smith, a local elder statesman of sign painting. www.straightcrooked.wordpress.com

About the Artists
Frank Smith was born in 1954 in rural upstate New York. In 1980 he founded Frank Smith Signs and continues today to provide quality commercial art and signs to business in the Capital Region and beyond. Smith also creates fine art, with creatures and masks made from found objects, post-consumer goods and obsolete machine components. According to Smith, although not all signs are art, signs produced with ample inspiration and technical ability can invoke meaning, humor and enduring messages. This is Smith’s first opportunity to bring signs into a gallery and present them as art. www.albanysigns.com

Rico Pendejo was born in New York City. He fell in love with the alphabet in 1990 and never looked back. Throughout the years his addiction to graffiti has opened the doors to many new passions like photography, graphic design, print making and most recently sign painting. Now a husband and father, Rico expresses himself through more legal avenues but his roots in the urban jungle remain integral to his work.

MC3 finds love in drips and sprays, noise, collective design, trains, words, and post authentic Americana, whether working on large installations or in his upstate New York studio.

“Letter Head” is produced by Albany Barn, Inc. Albany Barn is a local nonprofit 501(c) (3) organization developing a permanent creative arts incubator and community arts center in Albany, NY called The Barn. Albany Barn has partnered with the Albany Housing Authority and the City of Albany to redevelop St. Joseph’s Academy, a long-vacant former school building in the Arbor Hill neighborhood, for that purpose. Stage 1 is located one block from St. Joseph’s Academy.